Filmmaker Magazine

BEST FILM NOT PLAYING AT A THEATER NEAR YOU @MOMA THIS WEEKEND

2009-11-20T21:44:00.006-05:00

Contributing Editor Brandon Harris has posted on his blog a new preview of Filmmaker and MoMA's annual "Best Film Not Playing at a Theater Near You" program, which unspools at the museum this week. Screening will be the five films that will be competing for the Gotham Award we sponsor on December 1. (For schedule and film descriptions, visit MoMA's site.)

Brandon writes that this year's program is the strongest we've put together in the six years of doing this series, and I agree. This isn't to say that previous years haven't been strong, but in the past we've always been able to indulge ourselves with some element of whimsicality in the selection process, including films that would truly be offbeat pictures in a theatrical context. This year, however, we have five films that all play great on the big screen and all herald important new talents. That these films don't have broader distribution is shocking.

Ry Russo-Young's You Won't Miss Me, starring Stella Schnabel, is a hypnotic film collage taking us into the inner life of a fascinating yet tough-to-like downtown actress. Russo-Young made the film in bits and pieces over a period of months, and it contains a lovely, unforced mixture of emotions, from happiness to despair, anxiety to abandon. Read Alicia Van Couvering's interview with the director here.

October Country is our lone doc. (One other strong doc was in contention up until the end but withdrew when it finalized distribution plans.) Like Russo-Young, filmmakers Michael Palmieri and Donal Mosher (chosen this year for our "25 New Faces") have made a film that seems to burrow under the psychic skin of its characters. A portrait of Mosher's own splintered upstate New York family, October Country impresses with the mysterious visual language it creates to connect its lost fathers, sons, mothers and daughters.

First-time filmmaker Damien Chazelle's Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench is an unexpected charmer, a film that will delight fans of street-level indie filmmaking as well as those who love music and movies about music. When I wrote about it for the blog, I referenced Once, and despite the film's more stringent formal ambitions, I don't think I'm that far off. Read the rest of what I wrote here.

San Francisco-based d.p. Frazier Bradshaw makes his feature debut with Everything Strange and New, and this was the film that was a discovery for many of us on the panel. Bradshaw's is an experimental portrait of a stultifying marriage seen through the eyes of its construction worker husband, who struggles to make ends meet while wondering what he's lost by accepting more commitment in his life. It's an American indie that seems especially attuned to the economic anxieties rippling through the nation right now.

Finally, Tariq Tapa's Zero Bridge is an astonishing debut, made by the director (another "25 New Face") out of his backpack (literally) in the Indian-occupied city of Srinagar, Kashmir. The neorealist tale tells the story of a teenage pickpocket, Dilawar, who plans to escape from both Kashmir and his strict uncle but whose plans are complicated when he forms a bond with a woman whose passport he has stolen. The film tells a human story while remaining attuned to the geo-political realities of the region, and it demonstrates the global ambitions of much current American independent film.

Members of our editorial staff are hosting the Q and A's (I'll be there Saturday afternoon and evening) so please stop by, see one or more of these movies, and then say hello.

Watch this preview of the series.

THIS WAS MTV IN THE '90s

2009-11-19T18:53:00.003-05:00

It didn't used to be all reality shows. In 1990 MTV aired Buzz, an experimental video art collage show by director Mark Pellington. Genesis P-Orridge, William Burroughs, RU Sirius, David Byrne, and other transgressive thinkers (oh yes, and Jon Bon Jovi) were all featured in the debut show, which was openly inspired by Bruce Conner and other experimental filmmakers. Boing Boing noticed that the first episode has been been posted to YouTube, and I've embedded the clips below.

OSCAR DOC SHORTLIST: THE COVE & FOOD, INC. IN; TYSON & CAPITALISM OUT

2009-11-18T23:42:00.008-05:00

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences have announced the 15 films that have made the shortlist for Best Documentary. Two of the most prised docs of the year made the list: Louie Psihoyos's The Cove and Robert Kenner's Food, Inc., as well as a few lesser known titles like Anders Ostergaard's Burma VJ and Matt Tyrnauer's Valentino: The Last Emperor. But surprisingly excluded were Michael Moore's Capitalism: A Love Story and James Toback's Tyson.

The 82nd Academy Awards nominations will be announced on February 2.

Best Documentary Shortlist:

The Beaches of Agnes
Agnes Varda, director

Burma VJ
Anders Ostergaard, director

The Cove
Louie Psihoyos, director

Every Little Step
James D. Stern and Adam Del Deo, directors

Facing Ali
Pete McCormack, director

Food, Inc.
Robert Kenner, director

Garbage Dreams
Mai Iskander, director

Living in Emergency: Stories of Doctors Without Borders
Mark N. Hopkins, director

The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers
Judith Ehrlich and Rick Goldsmith, directors

Mugabe and the White African
Andrew Thompson and Lucy Bailey, directors

Sergio
Greg Barker, director

Soundtrack for a Revolution
Bill Guttentag and Dan Sturman, directors

Under Our Skin
Andy Abrahams Wilson, director

Valentino: The Last Emperor
Matt Tyrnauer, director

Which Way Home
Rebecca Cammisa, director

READY TO RECord

2009-11-18T12:53:00.012-05:00

The Sundance Institute announced today the 13 artists selected for the New Frontier section at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival. These works will be shown at New Frontier on Main, open to the public Thursday, January 21 through Saturday, January 30, 2010. (The full list of artists are below.)

One of the artists chosen this year is actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt (pictured), who we discovered last year has an interest in the new media/digital artists on the Web as he's created the site hitRECord.org. In the Spring 2009 issue we talked to him about the site, which at the time was still not fully realized he admitted, but his goal is to have the site be a home where filmmakers, artists, poets, musicians, ect. can start or contribute to works (or what he calls "remix" works) in a supportive community with the final project owned by the community. "This is my whole take on the Internet creative culture," Gordon-Levitt says in the piece. "Why would you take time out to be negative? Instead of posting something that’s negative I’d rather move on and look for something good. Everyone [who comes to the site] understands this and has built a positive community." He continues: "What is good about hitRECord is that you don’t have to confront that blank page. I see what’s getting a lot of hearts (the way works are rated on the site), I add something to it and reupload it. The idea is if lots of people do that we’ll get a collective refining of our records. It’s not about an individual author; it’s the desires of what I hope will be hundreds of refinements."

According to the release, Gordon-Levitt plans on "creating a cohesive short multimedia work that will have a special screening at the end of the Festival."

Click here to learn more about the site.

2010 New Frontier Artists:

Artist Spotlight

Gina Czarnecki
“Nascent,” “Cell Mass N2,” “Infected”
Multimedia artist, Gina Czarnecki, explores the convergence of biology, sensuality, dance, and the cinematic in her mesmerizing single channel installations. Developed in collaboration with biotechnologists, computer programmers, dancers, and sound artists, Czarnecki crafts gorgeous, digital meditations on the human form in motion, gazing across scale, blurring the boundaries between the mass and the cellular, and investigating what is possible when nature ends and the technologically manipulated begins. Czarnecki’s works have been exhibited throughout the world. Czarnecki currently lives and works in Liverpool, UK. For additional information on this artist go here: http://www.ginaczarnecki.com/

Petko Dourmana
“Post Global Warming Survival Kit”
Petko Dourmana’s fascinating interactive multimedia installation invites audiences to explore a post apocalyptic landscape and visit the workplace of a person whose job it is to observe the border between land and the rising sea. Upon entering the room, viewers at first think there is nothing in it but an old caravan. However, once they alter their ability to see through the darkness with night vision devices, viewers can experience and explore the hauntingly futuristic landscape surrounding them. For additional information on this piece go here: http://www.dourmana.com/node/5

Petko Dourmana is a media artist based in Sofia, Bulgaria. As a founder and chairman of InterSpace Association since 1998 Dourmana has been involved in production and co-production of art events and projects with Bulgarian and international artists and activists. Additional Information on the artist can be found here: http://www.dourmana.com/

Thomas Glaeser and Jens Franke
“The Earthwalk”
Attention Google Earth Junkies! Digital media designers Thomas Glaeser and Jens Franke invite you to surf the globe with your feet! Their installation, THE EARTHWALK, offers an intuitive way of controlling Google Earth by letting the user navigate the earth’s surface by stepping onto a map projected on the floor. Fly around the world in one minute or descend upon they city of your choice and become immersed in your favorite tangle of streets. THE EARTHWALK lets you soar and explore the planet, one step at a time. To see a video of the piece go here: http://bit.ly/3p31Zd

Jens Franke is a German based user interface designer currently working at Intuity Media Lab GmbH. Thomas Glaeser specializes in research and conception in the field of interface and interaction design. He is currently a managing partner of Envis Precisely.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt
“hitRECord.org”
Part media workshop, part social network, and part art exhibition, hitRECord.org is a hybrid production enterprise that taps crowd sourced creativity and topples traditional ideas of artistic ownership, online communication, and art production. Actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s (“500 Days of Summer,” “Mysterious Skin,” “Brick”) invites audiences to collectively collaborate with him in the filmmaking process, and create, record, and remix each other’s art (video, music, photos, writing, etc.) with the goal of creating cohesive short multimedia work that will have a special screening at the end of the Festival. To learn more about hitRECord go to: http://hitrecord.org/

Eric Gradman
“Cloud Mirror”
Artist and computer scientist, Eric Gradman brings online social networking back into the human realm with, Cloud Mirror, an interactive augmented reality art installation that merges audiences with their online identities. Step in front of the magic mirror and you will see yourself in the flesh. You will also see your “second skin” - a thought bubble with information from your Facebook, Twitter, and other social network identities. Anyone who has properly registered can participate in this playful and insightful work which aims to bring online intimacy back into human interaction. To see a video of the piece go here: http://www.exothermia.net/monkeys_and_robots/

Gradman recently graduated from the University of Southern California with his Masters in Computer Science. He currently lives and works in the greater Los Angeles area.

Michael Joaquin Grey
“Various Titles”
Computational artist Michael Joaquin Grey creates “objects” out of film. Orbiting planets pulse with the beat of Miles Davis; the classic film, The Wizard of Oz, throbs and spins around its own axis; the impossible life/death cycle of cartoon characters take the shape of morphing slime molds; and a cinematic Escher’s knot articulates the continuum between teen sex and pregnancy. Beautiful, elegant, and fascinating to watch, Grey’s artwork exists at the boundaries of art, science, and media and contemplates the origins of life, language, and physical form.

For the past twenty years, Michael Joaquin Grey has been creating work that extends and plays with the boundaries of art, science, and media. Most recently he has been exploring computational cinema and choreography with sound, motion and video. Additional information on this artist can be found here: www.citroid.com/. Images of Grey’s work can be found here: http://www.bitforms.com/michael-joaquin-grey-gallery.html.

Ragnar Kjartansson
“The End”
A soulful siren song lures the viewer to attend a magical surround sound concert performed from five different locations in the Canadian Rockies. Icelandic musician and performance artist, Ragnar Kjartansson’s mesmerizing 5-channel installation is a portal to another time and place, transporting the viewer to a sweeping expanse of alpine landscape where just two musicians, Ragnar & Davio Por Jonsson fill the crisp snowy air with an entire ensemble band of electric and acoustic guitars, banjos, drums, and a grand piano. To see a video of the installation go here: http://bit.ly/3gQD4h.

Ragnar Kjartansson graduated from the Icelandic Academy of arts in 2001. His work spans durational performance, theatre, painting, video, and music. Kjartansson has been in numerous solo and group exhibitions throughout the world. For additional information on the artist go here: http://this.is/rassi/

Matthew Moore
“Lifecycles”
As a fourth-generation Arizona farmer whose land is currently being encroached upon by suburban sprawl, Matthew Moore designs his installations to reconnect consumers to their local geographies and the life cycles of the Earth and its produce. Lifecycles is a multimedia installation that reconfigures the produce section of a Park City grocery store and transforms the experience of shopping for vegetables into a beautiful meditation that brings us closer to the lifecycles of the produce we buy and consume.

Moore grew up working on his family’s farm in Waddell, Arizona. Moore’s artwork grew out of his background in farming. Moore says, “As a farmer and an artist, I display the realities of the trials and tribulations of American agriculture, its roles in contemporary globalization, and its questionable ecological practices create a foundation for my explorations.” To see more of Moore’s artwork go to: www.urbanplough.com

Pipilotti Rist
“Lobe of Lung: The Saliva Ooze Away To The Underground”
The deviously delicious imagination of internationally renowned multimedia artist Pipilotti Rist invites audiences to lie back and lounge inside her film. Lobe of the Lung is a fully immersive installation rendition of her debut feature film Pepperminta, which is being screened in New Frontier’s film program. Starring two humans, a pig, and an earthworm, Lobe of the Lung merges fantasy with reality as it opens up the walls of New Frontier onto a luscious panoramic poem that bathes audiences in audiovisual delight.

Pipilotti Rist was born in 1962 in Grabs, Switzerland. Rist’s works have been exhibited widely at museums and festivals throughout the world. Rist currently lives and works in Zurich, Switzerland. Additional Information on the artist, and links to her gallery and feature film can be found here: http://www.pipilottirist.net/

Tracey Snelling
“Bordertown”
Snelling’s exquisitely crafted miniature sculptures of buildings and landscapes conjure a visceral sense of time and place and emanate a life that comes from within. Incorporating architecture, photography, collage, film, and audio, Snelling presents a carnivalesque tableau of the Mexican/American border that tells the story of a sweeping locale and of the individual inhabitants residing inside the buildings, streets, and alleyways. The cinematic image stands in for real life and it unspools behind windowpanes, conjuring a sublime sense of both wonder and nostalgia. Snelling currently lives and works in Oakland, CA. Additional Information on the artist can be found here: http://traceysnelling.com/portfolio.html

Performances

Nao Bustamante
“Silver and Gold”
Filmmaker and performance artist Nao Bustamante returns to Sundance with a deliciously outrageous and ambitious new work; her short film Untitled #1 (from the series Earth People 2507), starring her toy poodle as a herd of buffalo, appeared at the 2008 Sundance Film Festival. Silver & Gold combines film, live performance, and original costumes into a self-proclaimed “filmformance” that evokes the muse of legendary filmmaker Jack Smith and his tribute to 1940s’ Dominican movie starlet Maria Montez in a magical and joyfully twisted exploration of race, glamour, sexuality, and the silver screen.

Nao Bustamante’s work encompasses performance art, sculpture, installation, and video. Her work has been shown throughout the world. Bustamante lives and works in New York. She is Assistant Professor of New Media and Live Art at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. For additional information on the artist go to: www.naobustamante.com

Kalup Linzy
“Sweet, Sampled, and Left Ova”
Kalup Linzy’s work is a splendid mix of southern culture, daytime soap opera, and the raunchy, shady humor of black gay culture, all turbocharged with fierce DIY Network determination. Linzy writes, directs, and stars in his hilariously melodramatic tales of love and flama. Following the video presentation, one of the characters, Taiwan, comes to life to star in a multimedia musical performance. Featuring the videos, Ride to da Club, Conversations wit de Churen VII: Lil Myron’s Trade, and episodes from the series Melody Set Me Free.

Kalup Linzy is a video and performance artist currently living and working in Brooklyn, NY who has performed the world over. To see Linzy’s Youtube station, Da Churen and Company, visit: http://www.youtube.com/user/kklinzy

THINGS TO DO IN DENVER WHEN YOU'RE DEAD

2009-11-18T01:30:00.004-05:00

The mountain came to Mohamed.

I picked up a bug that lingered and made me miserable. But I had accepted the honor of being a juror for the Kieslowski Prize at the 31st Starz Denver Film Festival, which began last week and runs through November 22. Only six foreign-language films were competing for our votes, and, either at other festivals or through the kindness of European sales agents, I had seen them all. (The prize is sponsored by Screen, for which I am a reviewer.) Something told me I should cover myself as a journalist just in case I didn’t heal in time, since I had promised to cover the event. So I made a list of films I hadn’t seen (many I had viewed at other fests) that seemed of particular interest and asked for screeners, which I received. In fact, I watched most of them on my laptop in the hospital.

Ultimately, I didn’t make it to Colorado. We did our jury deliberation over the phone (winner announced this weekend, sorry). And I am keeping my word about writing on the festival—without attending. Which begs the question, why go to festivals, especially ones with few or no premieres, unless you live in that city and it’s your only shot at seeing the stuff that’s being packed and repacked in film cans and sent all over the world that year?

That’s a big topic, but I want to make clear that the reason I offered to write something is that, once I saw the festival’s website, I realized this fest is a huge cut above the usual regional festival (even if such bland regional films as Donal Mosher and Michael Palmieri’s October Country, Bill Ross and Turner Ross’s 45365, and Hue Rhodes’s Saint John of Las Vegas did little to enhance the genre), with provocative programming, useful panels, and career awards given for talent—Ed Harris, avant-gardist Ernie Gehr, Hal Holbrook, and J.K. Simmons--rather than for generating media buzz. It is greener than any other festival I know, and it is the only one to my knowledge with an “animation station.” They do have a red carpet, but I doubt anyone there takes it too seriously.

More than that, I know Denver well enough to have expected a sizable Latin American selection (it has a large Mexican community), but I was shocked to find that so many of the best films were from the East (Eastern Europe, the Near East, the Middle East). I’m not sure of the reasons (and why the Kieslowski Prize there?), but who cares? Few worthwhile films from Western Europe and from the U.S. indie scene were in the mix, though you might have expected otherwise.

It’s gratifying to know that an audience in a city of Denver's size not only attends the eastern movies, they go year-round to the seven-screen Starz Film Center to view alternative cinema. (I do hope the docs they show during the year are a cut above the interesting but formless, tv-like ones screened during the festival, like William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe, by the leftist lawyer’s daughters Emily Kunstler and Sarah Kunstler; American Faust: From Condi to Neo-Condi, by British documentarian Sebastian Doggart; and Barbara Brancaccio and Joshua Zeman’s limp Cropsey, about a series of murders on Staten Island.) After all, don’t we like to think that such relatively esoteric fare is appreciated only on the coasts? I don’t know them, but the programmers there cast a wide net and are open to what many middle Americans would find…strange. And you thought the host town of the 2008 Democratic Convention was merely an isolated case of urban sprawl that ends with the Rocky Mountains.

The finest of the Spanish-language films are from Mexico, as you might expect. That all involve the financial underpinnings of survival comes as no surprise, but all classes—and levels of desperation--are covered. Rigoberto Perezcano’s Northless is a very accomplished debut. A young man, Andres, with a family in Oaxaca arrives in Tijuana with the intent of sneaking into the U.S. to work and send money back home. Perezcano does something clever here while Andres stops in Tijuana and works in a small family store. The narrative could have just bypassed that period but instead Perezcano studies the dynamics of Mexicans in roughly the same boat, sensitive people whose lives are on hold either because they are waiting to cross, or they are hoping, mostly in vain, that a loved one who made it over will return for them. This is a lovely, poignant film that accepts the sociological constraints hovering over its characters, nice people who have a zest for life but no assurance what it might bring them day to day.

In The Tree, by Carlos Serrano Azcona, Santiago lacks Andres’s firm goal. He is a Mexican slacker in Madrid, just out of a badly failed marriage, unemployed, aimless. He moves with the speed of a slug. This quiet masterpiece valorizes the quotidian in all our lives, no matter how trivial it may seem to others. It is part of our own personal paths toward something: in Santiago’s case, salvation.

Ariel Gordon's Black Box is more sophisticated. Its characters are from higher classes, tied up in big business, which implies corruption and dirty tricks. A slick con man whose bio is presented through animation and step printing hires a businessman to kill the president. He knows the man has a family and a terminal disease, and convinces him that his wife and children will be cared for. The desperate man accepts, quits, accepts, quits: He wants to have his cake and eat it, too. The con man is experienced, he knows all the tricks, but still, something about their sparring gets to him and the two bond and recognize their similarities.

Not that the region didn’t provide it’s share of clunkers as well. The worst film I’ve ever seen is Alberto Cortes’s Heart of Time, a déjà vu propaganda piece out of Chiapas wrapped in a trite love story.

Except for Andrea Arnold’s Loachian Fish Tank, from Scotland, and Dutch director Esther Rots’s surprisingly effective psychological thriller Can Go Through Skin, the western European fare was unimpressive. So many festivals showcase them to a fault, this is not a cardinal sin; in fact, it’s refreshing. But Noud Heerkens’s Dutch movie Last Conversation, its main idea of a single character driving and speaking stolen from Kiarostami, is as much a fraud as a bore. And Italian screenwriter-turned-filmmaker Gianni di Grigorio’s fluffy Mid-August Lunch, about a middle-aged man stuck preparing a big dinner for some lovable old ladies, begs for you to adore it, even if it has RAI television written over every frame.

At the other extreme is Film Ist. A Girl & a Gun, Austrian director Gustav Deutsch’s forced collection of archival footage to make some vague point about sex and death in early cinema. Playing a burnt-out actress with heavy psychological baggage, the great Danish actress Paprika Steen nearly saves Martin Pieter Zandvliet’s lazy Applause, which would evaporate without her presence. And the French master Andre Techine is represented by The Girl on the Train, a beautifully made if overscripted story about a non-Jewish teen who pretends she has been mistaken for a Jew and is the victim of a hate crime.

Things get so much better the further east we go. Marek Najbrt’s Protector, from the Czech Republic, is a revelation. Frantic film noir is the appropriate style for this ‘40s-set movie centered on a married couple whose happiness is marred by the politics of the Nazi occupation. She is a Jewish actress, and her fortunes slide; he is a well-known non-Jewish radio personality whose latent opportunism serves him well under new masters. The structuring absence is the assassination of Heydrich, but it is way in the background, the better to foreground the main characters and some of their unusual acquaintances, each of whom has a different way of coping with the new leadership.

Andrey Khrzhanovsky is a Russian animator who fuses live action, animation, and doc footage in the lovely nostalgic piece A Room and a Half, or a Sentimental Journey to the Homeland. The film’s conceit is that poet Joseph Brodsky makes a trip back to the Soviet Union after his expulsion, something that never happened, but which provides Khrzhanovsky an opportunity to observe life there over several decades through the eyes of Brodsky. The only child clearly adored his parents, and like all Russians, he adored Mother Russia.

A Man Who Ate His Cherries, by Iranian filmmaker Payman Haghani—we’re still east--is one of the discoveries of the festival. Like many good Iranian films today, it tells of an individual’s persistence in the face of adversity. Reza is a worker who must pay back his wife’s dowry in a nasty divorce settlement but hasn’t the money. He is being milked, but is stuck, and tries every possible avenue to resolve the dilemma. But there is no solution, especially in this society in which lots of laws and customs make little sense. He resorts to a dangerous scam to get the funds. The film is beautifully shot, and we fully identify with Reza by movie’s end.

A special mention: Damien Chazelle’s American indie film Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench premiered at Tribeca. I’m not sure why it wasn’t in Sundance: This is the finest U.S. indie movie of the past year. Shot in black and white in Boston and New York, it is cinema as music, both in topic and in form, a blend of classical Hollywood musical, New Wave homage to the Hollywood musical, beatnik movie, city symphony film, and handheld camera verite—all colored by a Cassavetes-like sensibility. Some characters sing their parts: It’s ballsy, but it works. The narrative isn’t heavy, it’s more like…jazz, or blues, the three main characters living life as best they can and rolling with the punches. Justin Hurwitz’s score is exceptional, and lead Jason Palmer plays a mean trumpet.

-- Howard Feinstein

TWO TAKEAWAYS FROM JON REISS @ THE IFC CENTER

2009-11-17T22:05:00.003-05:00

Thanks to everyone who came out tonight for the first in our series, "A New World: A User's Guide for Filmmakers and Audiences" at the IFC Center. The speaker was Jon Reiss, who gave listeners an accelerated yet detailed overview of his thoughts on DIY distribution and what a theatrical release means today. (Some of these thoughts can be found in this article in Filmmaker.)

There was a lot to take away, but here are a couple of things that impressed themselves on me.

1. During the development of your project, think of five specific audiences your film will appeal to. Jon said that too many people think of their audiences too broadly, like, "I think my film will appeal to women between the ages of 25 to 45." That's a demographic, not an audience. You have to be a lot more specific because that specificity is what enables you to tap into a niche audience that will mobilize itself around your film. Jon said that Valentino director Matt Tyrnauer was surprised to discover that women's sewing groups were buying blocks of tickets for his doc on the great fashion designer.

The trick, then, becomes not just identifying those niches early on but — and this is my addition — developing your film so that these potential niches are motivated to rally around it. This doesn't mean pandering to an audience — it means making sure that you present your subject matters in fresh, original, and deep ways so as to inspire those naturally predisposed to them.

2. Prioritize among the four goals for a feature filmmaker. Jon discussed the four things a filmmaker might hope to get from their film. The first is furthering of his or her career. This could come in the form of a development deal, an agent, a studio assignment, financing of a second film, etc. The second is money. The third is to get your film seen, to communicate and reach people. The fourth is to change the world, or to advance a particular social or political message. (He also spun out two or three others, including becoming famous, developing a long-term fan base and demonstrating green practices.) What was interesting to me was his simple declaration that all of these goals could not be aspired towards in the same proportions. A filmmaker has to clearly prioritize which of these is most important to him or her and guide his expectations accordingly.

Jon's book, Think Outside the Box (Office), has just been released, and you can buy it from him with a special 12% discount courtesy of Filmmaker by clicking on the link below.

To Order Think Outside the Box Office with 12% Off and Bonus Gifts - Click Here!

JON REISS AT THE IFC CENTER TONIGHT

2009-11-17T14:26:00.008-05:00

After a great week of discussions on our Weekly Player forum, Jon Reiss will be at the IFC Center tonight in NYC to conduct our first in a series of events at the Center on new, digital-era ways of financing, distributing, marketing and building an audience for independent films. Reiss's seminar will teach how to create unique distribution and marketing plans for independent films. He will also be selling copies of his new book Think Outside the Box (Office): The Ultimate Guide to Film Distribution and Marketing in the Digital Era.

Over at indieWIRE today the site has published a speech Reiss gave recently at at the CPH:DOX Forum in Copenhagen on new distribution methods.

Click here to purchase tickets to the event.

FILMMAKER/APPLE PRESENTS MEET THE FILMMAKER: JOHN HILLCOAT

2009-11-17T09:00:00.000-05:00

Tonight at 7pm we will continue our Meet The Filmmaker series at the Apple Store in SoHo (103 Prince St) with a discussion with The Road director John Hillcoat. Based on the Cormac McCarthy best-selling novel, the film stars Viggo Mortensen and Kodi Smit-McPhee as a father and son trying to survive in a post-apocalyptic world.

For the Fall 2008 issue we were granted an exclusive visit to Hillcoat's edit room to talk to him as he put the finishing touches on the film. “The material doesn‘t shy away from the worst aspects of humanity, yet what‘s unusual about it is that it also has a sentimental love story at the heart of it, in a world that‘s dark and brutal although believable,” says Hillcoat about the film. “It‘s tricky, but it‘s real and that‘s why we decided to shoot it on location. The book had a real immediacy about it in that this is exactly how people would behave.” Read more here.

Event is open to the public.

The Weinstein Company opens The Road Nov. 25.

I CAN DIE NOW

2009-11-15T16:44:00.002-05:00

Forget the Oscars, as a producer, I can die now. (You need to watch both clips, and the first one especially to the end.)

Original Video- More videos at TinyPic

Seriously, when Harmony Korine forwarded me these links, I thought they were great and couldn't stop laughing. And then I thought about what we producers go through when trying to obtain music for our films. I can't remember how much we paid for the music rights for the Roy Orbison version of the Patsy Cline song "Crying" that closes out Gummo, but I'm sure it was a lot less than we'd be charged for it today now that licensors have jacked up their rates to compensate for declining record sales. I think it can be safely said, though, that the song's inclusion in Gummo 12 years ago has just paid off for the publishers with an unexpected dividend that's far beyond that license fee.

Licensors, see — it pays off to put your music in indie films.

JON REISS ON OUR FORUMS, AT THE IFC CENTER AND (MAYBE) FREE IN YOUR MAILBOX

2009-11-08T19:40:00.005-05:00

We inaugurate our “Weekly Player” series with filmmaker Jon Reiss (Bomb It), who will be on the forums all this week (November 9 - 16) answering your questions about DIY distribution, marketing, publicity and outreach. Jon is the author the new book, Think Outside the Box (Office): The Ultimate Guide to Film Distribution and Marketing for the Digital Era, and readers will know him from the great series of articles he’s written for us — “My Adventure in Theatrical Self-Distribution," “My Adventure in Home Video," and “How to Market Your DVD Online." These articles grew into the book, which I've read and think is an indispensable manual for filmmakers figuring out how to launch their works in today’s new digital world.

So, if you aren’t a member yet of the Filmmaker Forums, I hope you become one this week and post your questions for Jon at the Weekly Player forum. It’s free, of course. As an incentive, we’ll be giving away five copies of Jon’s book to the originating posters of what we judge to be the five best threads.

Finally, Jon will also be the speaker at part one of our series at the IFC Center, “The New World: A User’s Guide for Filmmakers and Audiences.” In this special series, experts on the new, digital-era ways of financing, distributing, marketing and building an audience for independent film will relay their hard-earned practical advice and strategies. Learn how the industry is shifting and providing fresh opportunities for films and audiences to connect in new ways. Technology is changing all the rules — we’ll track the new revenue sources being created for filmmakers and help audiences navigate the expanding options.
Jon’s seminar, which takes place Tuesday, November 17 at 6:00PM, will teach how to create unique distribution and marketing plans for independent films, explaining both do-it-yourself and hybrid approaches. He will outline what filmmakers need to do to prepare for distribution while making their films. Finally he will details ways in which filmmakers can take back and redefine the theatrical release by playing a combination of conventional theaters, community screenings and festivals. Admission is only $12.50, and tickets can be bought here.

One more thing: if, hanging out on the forums you decide you’d like Jon’s book, he’s offering a $5 discount coupon at his site.

Hope to see some of you online this week and in person next week at the IFC Center.

ARE YOU OBJECTIFIED?

2009-11-06T10:00:00.005-05:00

2ND UPDATE: We have our winners. Thanks, all!

UPDATE: To win a digital copy of Objectified, answer the question below and email editor.filmmakermagazine AT gmail.com.

Almost three years ago I decided to check out what seemed to be an obscure little documentary about graphic design at SXSW and was surprised to find the line to get in stretching all the way down the length of the convention hall. As the editor of a magazine, the subject matter of Gary Hustwit’s Helvetica — an examination of the historical, communicative and ideological meanings of that ubiquitous typeface — interested me. I hadn’t realized that SXSW, which is full of filmmakers, musicians and web designers who all have Adobe InDesign loaded on their laptops, contained a huge ready-made audience for Hustwit’s smart and engaging take on contemporary graphic design.

This past year at SXSW, Hustwit returned with what he revealed during the pre-screening intro as the second in a series of design-themed movies, Objectified. The new film looks at the world of industrial design, which translates into the people who make the things that are the props of our lives. As the film points out, everything from a potato peeler to a chair to a faucet to a sports car to an iPod is designed, and that fusion of aesthetics and functionality contains an assumption about not only our relationship to the objects that surround us but our concepts of our own identities as well. In Objectified, Hustwit talks with a number of people who make stuff but, as with Helvetica, his aim is not to create a dry history of industrial design. Instead, Hustwit takes us on a rhetorical journey that ends with a series of discussions questioning the logic of object production in an environmentally-taxed, wasteful, and over-marketed consumer society. What makes Objectified work, and what elevates it over the quite-good Helvetica, is the progression of its discourse. Yes, the objects in this film, perfectly lit and shot against stark white backgrounds, are dutifully fetishized — Apple ads come to life — but the documentary makes its greatest impact as it moves from issues surrounding object production to questions of why objects should be made at all. As 3D printers prepare to do to the object-making industries what filesharing has done to the content businesses, Objectified is an affectionate dissection of our urge to love ourselves through what we can hold, handle, use, and buy.

Objectified is now available in a variety of formats, including Blu-Ray, a limited edition DVD, and a limited edition USB. (Check the website for more details.) It's also available in non-physical form on iTunes, and the good folks at New Video have provided Filmmaker with three digital copies for our readers. Here are the details. You have to be a U.S. resident. And, you have to have an iTunes account or, if you win, set one up. Oh yeah — to make this just a tiny, tiny bit less easy, you have to answer a question: what object inspires Steven Heller, co-chair of the Design Program at the School of Visual Arts and author of the "Visuals" column of the New York Times Book Review? (Hint: you might check out Hustwit's "Objectify Me" blog...) The first three people who email me at editor.filmmakermagazine AT gmail.com will receive a free iTunes download of Objectified.

FILMMAKER/APPLE PRESENTS MEET THE FILMMAKER: JASON REITMAN

2009-11-06T09:00:00.011-05:00

Tonight at 7pm head over to the NYC Apple Store in SoHo (103 Prince Street) for what's sure to be a lively and entertaining conversation with director Jason Reitman. He'll be talking about his latest film Up in the Air starring George Clooney as a corporate downsizer whose life of collecting frequent flyer miles, perks and no-strings-attached hookups is in jeopardy. Interviewing Reitman for the Fall issue, Scott Macaulay writes: "One of the most astonishing things about Up in the Air is the clear eye it casts on 2009 America and a workforce undergoing the shock treatment of recession, outsourcing and the creative destruction of so many of our traditional industries.... Reitman refuses to go for stock Hollywood uplift with a last line and image that's among the most resonant cinematic closers I can remember." Be sure to get a free copy of the Fall issue at the event to read the rest of the interview.

The event is open to the public.

Paramount opens Up in the Air Dec. 25.

THE FONT OF ANGER

2009-11-04T23:46:00.002-05:00

Aaron Leming, who works as a specialist at the Southlake Town Square Apple Store in Dallas, created this resonant typographic rendition of Paddy Chayefsky's famous Howard Beale "Mad as Hell" speech from Network.

Mad As Hell! Kinetic Typography from Aaron Leming on Vimeo.

A CHANGING OF THE GUARD AT OUR DIRECTOR INTERVIEWS COLUMN

2009-11-04T19:57:00.002-05:00

Back in March, 2007, with his talk with Color Me Kubrick's Brian Cook, Nick Dawson inaugurated a new column here at Filmmakermagazine.com: the Director Interviews. Over the course of two-and-a-half years, he infallibly spun out thoughtful and provocative discussions with directors ranging from emerging American indies to big-name international auteurs to everyone in between. Viewing the bulk of each week's releases before honing in on one person to speak with, Dawson brought dedication, scholarship and personality to a column that was always, first and foremost, simply a great read.

Earlier this year Dawson published his first book, Being Hal Ashby: Life of a Hollywood Rebel, a rigorously researched, page-turning biography of the iconic director that is highly recommended, and now he's stepping down from the column to pursue other work and family projects. We thank Nick for his great work establishing this column and look forward to his frequent, we hope, future contributions to the pages of Filmmaker Magazine.

With this week's interview with Collapse's Chris Smith, the Director Interviews is handed over to two great writers and critics whose names will be familiar to our readers: Brandon Harris and Damon Smith. Brandon, of course, is one of our Contributing Editors and has his own blog, Cinema Echo Chamber. He's also an active writer/director and producer whose first feature I hope to see shooting sometime soon. Smith is a writer whose work has appeared in not only Filmmaker but Time Out New York, Senses of Cinema, the Boston Phoenix, Bright Lights Film Journal, and Filmcatcher. Welcome, Brandon and Damon!

Below: Chris Smith's Collapse mashed-up with Roland Emmerich's 2012.

SCHOOL'S OUT: ASTRA TAYLOR ON THE UNSCHOOLED LIFE

2009-11-04T19:20:00.002-05:00

Filmmaker Astra Taylor (Examined Life) gave the debut Artist Talk for the Walker Art Center's "Raising Creative Kids" series. The series is described as an initiative "designed to make the Walker a destination and resource for families and parents wanting to creatively engage their children."

Here's their description of the talk:

Raised by independent-thinking bohemian parents, Taylor was unschooled until age 13. Join the filmmaker as she shares her personal experiences of growing up home-schooled without a curriculum or schedule, and how it has shaped her educational philosophy and development as an artist.

And, it is embedded below:

SUNDANCE BRINGS 2010 FESTIVAL TO A CITY NEAR YOU

2009-11-04T13:21:00.012-05:00

The Sundance Institute announced today the creation of Sundance Film Festival U.S.A. where direct-from-festival films from the upcoming 2010 festival will be screened nationwide in theaters in eight cities on the Thursday of the festival (Jan. 28). This will conincide with events and premiere screenings back at the festival, including the North American premiere of the socio-political documentary The Shock Doctrine, from directors Michael Winterbottom and Mat Whitecross. The Sundance Film Festival runs January 21-31, 2010.

From the release:

On January 28, eight filmmakers and their films will be dispatched from Park City to cities across America, for the first time providing audiences the opportunity to experience screenings direct from the Festival in their home town art houses and to engage in live conversation with Festival artists. An introduction video featuring Robert Redford and highlights from the Festival will precede the screenings. Selections for films and filmmakers traveling to the eight cities will take place shortly after the programming announcement in December. All films will be selected from the official Sundance Film Festival program. Tickets will be available through each theatre’s individual box office. Southwest Airlines is the official airline partner of Sundance Film Festival U.S.A.

The participating cities and theaters are:
Ann Arbor, MI -- Michigan Theater
Brookline, MA -- Coolidge Corner Theatre
Brooklyn, NY -- BAM
Chicago, IL -- Music Box Theatre
Los Angeles, CA -- Downtown Independent
Madison, WI -- Sundance Cinemas Madison
Nashville, TN -- The Belcourt Theatre
San Francisco, CA -- Sundance Kabuki Cinemas

GONE BUT NEVER FORGOTTEN

2009-11-03T19:12:00.022-05:00

Before the tragic sudden death of John Hughes this past summer four filmmakers from Toronto -- Michael Facciolo (producer) , Kari Hollend (producer), Lenny Panzer (co-creator) and Matt Austin Sadowski (director) -- spent four years making a tribute documentary about the reclusive director, nabbing interviews with some of the main actors from his films (Andrew McCarthy, Ally Sheedy, Judd Nelson to name a few), directors who have been influenced by his iconic work (Kevin Smith and Jason Reitman) and traveling to Illinois last year to find Hughes.

After Hughes's death the project suddenly became a hot commodity and got a worldwide deal with Alliance Films which released the film, Don't You Forget About Me, on DVD today. Learn more about the film here. It's available at Best Buy, Walmart, iTunes, Blockbuster and other stores.

Seeing the trailer below, it looks like it's a must see for any Hughes fan.

HOW THEY DID IT: ISN'T SHE?...

2009-11-02T12:10:00.007-05:00

Or I should say, how he did it.

Here, Jamie Stuart breaks down the visual effects and tweaks he did for his short, Isn't She?..., through Final Cut Studio and Photoshop.

Watch Isn't She?...
Read parts 1 & 2 of Jamie's review of Final Cut Studio.

PLAY THAT FUNKY MUSIC

2009-11-01T15:06:00.012-05:00

If you've read the latest issue (or run into me recently) you know that I dig the blaxploitation spoof, Black Dynamite. From its straight face acting to the way it was shot, director Scott Sanders (aka Suckapunch) and star Michael Jai White have created an impressive comedy that aesthetically holds up to most of the real blaxploitations of the 70s and puts a shot in the arm of the recently watered down spoof genre.

But one of Dynamite's greatest aspects is its music. The film's editor, Adrian Younge, created the original score through the use of instruments and analog recording equipment from the era the film is based in. He explains how he did this in a sidebar to our Black Dynamite feature in the Fall issue. But below is a promo of the soundtrack's release through the indie magazine/record label Wax Poetics which touches on how Younge created the sound. You can buy the score and soundtrack on their site. Black Dynamite is currently playing in theaters.

BATTSEK EXITS MIRAMAX

2009-10-30T15:19:00.009-04:00

According to Variety, Miramax president Daniel Battsek has been let go. This is on the heels of parent company, Disney, scalling down the specialty division's staff and release schedule. Under Battsek Miramax released award-winning titles The Queen and No Country for Old Men.

And according to Nikki Finke at Deadline Hollywood, Miramax's New York office is closing down and its LA office will move to the Disney lot in Burbank.

DIGITAL DILEMMA SURVEY RESULTS

2009-10-30T09:00:00.000-04:00

In September we put up a survey on our site that aimed at getting input from filmmakers about some of the issues that impact the making and preservation of their films.

Below are the results of the survey. These stats have been passed on to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for their final report which they will be publishing sometime next year.

The only results that aren't posted below are the ones where a written answer was required.

And for those who aren't familiar, read the story that inspired this survey.

Thanks to those who participated.

Please check all boxes that apply to you
Director - 72 (77%)
Producer - 64 (69%)
Production company owner - 28 (30%)
Production company executive - 5 (5%)
Executive producer - 13 (14%)
Writer - 51 (55%)
Editor - 44 (47%)
Cinematographer - 37 (40%)
Post-Production supervisor - 19 (20%)
Other - 9 (10%)
People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

Do you work principally in
Theatrical features - 41 (46%)
Documentaries - 24 (27%)
Other - 25 (28%)

Are your projects photographed principally in
35mm - 11 (12%)
16mm - 12 (13%)
Digitally - 71 (76%)
Hybrid (mix of film and digital) - 15 (16%)
People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

Does the choice of post-production processes influence your image capture decision?
Yes - 56
No - 36

How are your projects edited?
Final Cut Pro - 75 (83%)
Avid - 24 (27%)
Other - 15 (17%)
People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

How are your projects finished?
Digital intermediate finish - 37 (42%)
Tape to tape color-graded - 16 (18%)
Filmed-out and release printed on film - 13 (15%)
Cut negative and answer print - 9 (10%)
Electronic finish only - 54 (61%)
People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

Do you have created content stored on different formats? If so, which formats?
Film - 47 (52%)
Digital Betacam - 45 (50%)
1" Videotape - 11 (12%)
HD Cam (or HD Cam SR) - 48 (53%)
VHS Videotape - 25 (28%)
D5 - 13 (14%)
3/4" U-Matic - 12 (13%)
DVD - 64 (71%)
Beta SP - 38 (42%)
Hard Drive - 73 (81%)
Other - 18 (20%)
People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

Do you transfer your older elements to newer formats in order to preserve them?
I haven't given much thought to updating formats. - 21 (23%)
I have thought about it, but can't afford it. - 19 (21%)
I have thought about it and plan to do it someday. - 17 (19%)
I have done some transfers to update storage formats. - 23 (26%)
I make a point of updating all of my masters when possible. - 7 (8%)
Other - 3 (3%)

In what type of environment are your final, edited masters stored?
Temperature and humidity controlled - 14 (16%)
Temperature controlled, but not humidity controlled - 13 (15%)
Some climate control - 29 (33%)
No climate control - 33 (38%)
Don't know - 8 (9%)
People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

Do you give much thought to how your works might be preserved for the long term (20 years plus) once they are finished?
Never - 16 (18%)
Sometimes - 48 (53%)
Often - 16 (18%)
Always - 11 (12%)

How about shorter-term access (up to 20 years)?
Never - 7 (8%)
Sometimes - 43 (47%)
Often - 23 (25%)
Always - 18

For your works, do you generally have input on how all production elements (dailies, audio, archival, ect.) are archived?
Never - 7 (8%)
Sometimes - 25 (27%)
Often - 13 (14%)
Always - 46

Who do you think is responsible for storing all production elements of your work(s)?
Producer - 43 (48%)
Executive producer - 12 (13%)
Production company - 36 (40%)
Distributor - 23 (26%)
Exhibitor (theatrical) - 1 (1%)
Exhibitor (television/cable) - 2 (2%)
Don't know - 11 (12%)
Other - 12 (13%)
People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

How are the production elements stored?
Temperature and humidity controlled - 18 (20%)
Temperature controlled, but not humidity controlled - 11 (12%)
Some climate control - 27 (30%)
No climate control - 28 (31%)
Don't know - 13 (15%)
People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

What best describes your feelings about knowing that a film has been converted to a digital format for future access?
I am relieved. - 39 (43%)
I have some concerns. - 34 (38%)
I don't really give it much thought. - 13 (14%)
I think it's a bad idea. - 3 (3%)
What does digital mean? - 0 (0%)
Other - 1 (1%)

If you already have a means of preservation in place, who pays for it?
Production company/Network - 13 (18%)
I pay for it. - 47 (64%)
Distributor - 4 (5%)
Don't know - 14 (19%)
Other - 6 (8%)
People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

Have you considered any forms of self-distribution?
Theater-by-theater - 39 (46%)
Internet - 66 (78%)
Direct to DVD - 59 (69%)
Downloads, short versions, ect. - 60 (71%)
People may select more than one checkbox, so percentages may add up to more than 100%.

TOASTING THE MEDIA MELTDOWN

2009-10-29T08:49:00.004-04:00

Producer Gill Holland forwarded me a link to this provocative interview by Eric Garland, whose company Big Champagne reports on filesharing activity for its customers — the major studios and broadcast networks. A lot of people talk about the relationship between what's happened to the music business and what's happening to the film business, but Garland effectively points out not only the similarities but also, promisingly, the differences. That said, he is not predicting that the mainstream film business will be able to maintain its revenue figures in a time of migrating audiences and technological change.

An excerpt from the CNET article:

CNET: But it doesn't appear that Hulu is making the kind of money that will satisfy content owners, at least those News Corp. and NBC Universal (Hulu's backers).

Garland: The cute answer, which is probably the truest answer, is that growing a sector is a privilege and not a right. There is no right size. There is no correct or God-given size for any sector. Why do we get to make movies that cost $300 million to make? Because we have found venues where people will spend more than $300 million on the result. If people spend only $50 million then the price of a movie must be $49 million or less.

I think in today's dollars no one could make "Gone With The Wind" because at the time this movie was made when everyone went to the movies. It was something like 79 percent of the population. The cute answer is that movies will get smaller.

I know people are tearing out hair and spinning in graves, but maybe "Transformers" has to be made for $75 million next time.

Oh my God, what am I saying? Put the words back in your mouth. That is just a pretty plain faced observation. One outcome might mean that in the Digital Age the return on investment on a major International tent-pole franchise is not a billion dollars. It's a quarter of that or a third. Therefore we have to get our costs in line with the market value.

When we talk about this in 3 or 5 or 7 years, one thing we will all have to concede is costs have to come down. We don't have the total control over the distribution chain that we exploited so well as industries for so long. Without that you can't take advantage of the consumer in the same way.

ATTENTION PRODUCERS! THE IFP/ROTTERDAM LAB FELLOWSHIP DEADLINE NOV. 13

2009-10-28T18:31:00.005-04:00

Young producers should seriously think about applying for the IFP/Rotterdam Lab Fellowship. I go to Rotterdam every year, and for U.S.-based producers it's a great place to learn the ins and outs of the global market for arthouse and specialty film. The deadline for this year's program is Friday, November 13. The official word is below.

Through its No Borders’ partnership with CineMart, IFP will select and provide travel assistance to two American producers to participate in the 2010 Rotterdam Lab Fellowship.

The Rotterdam Lab is a four-day training workshop which runs concurrently with the CineMart Co-Production Market. Designed to build up the international networks and knowledge of producers in its professional panels and speed-dating sessions, lab participants will enjoy formal and informal meetings with colleagues and numerous representatives in the international finance, production, sales and distribution sectors.

Recent IFP/ROTTERDAM Lab Fellows include: Paul Mezey, Karin Chien, Noah Harlan, Jamin O’Brien, Anish Savjani and Mynette Louie.

Those interested in consideration for the program should apply with a letter of interest and a resume to Amy Dotson,Deputy Director IFP at adotson AT ifp.org by Friday, November 13th. Applicants should have at least one feature-film credit and be a current IFP member.

For more information on CineMart and the Rotterdam Film Festival go to the International Film Festival Rotterdam website.

THE WINDMILL MOVIE ON HBO TONIGHT

2009-10-28T16:23:00.000-04:00

We here at Filmmaker have been big fans of Alexander Olch's experimental memoir/documentary The Windmill Movie since seeing it at the New York Film Festival in '08. If you missed it in theaters over the summer it will premiere on HBO2 tonight @ 8pm.

For those who don't know about it, the film is about the 300 hours of autobiographical footage left behind by filmmaker/professor Richard P. Rogers after his death in 2001. Olch (who was a student of Rogers's) was calling in to look over the footage and finish the film his mentor never could. What he delivers is a fascinating essay filled with Rogers's footage (including beautiful landscapes of the Hamptons), audio recordings, actors like Wallace Shawn playing Rogers, and Olch's narration.

Scott Macaulay interviewed Olch for the Spring '09 issue. Here's an excerpt from it.

Was the conceit of you making his autobiographical film there from the beginning? Or was it originally more of a third-person portrait? I was not particularly interested in just executing somebody else's idea. What was actually compelling about the project was that there was this mix of elements in it. It was a story about a guy who's trying to figure out how to make this movie that in some ways is about how he can't figure out how to make the movie. And so I'm them constructing a story that really had very little to do with the material that he left. I mean, some of the tricky parts of producing their project [involved] negotiating the fact that I was really kind of dancing around the edges of what you probably would think were his intentions if you looked at the footage. His plan was definitely geared much more toward a piece about the community, about his history in Georgica, in the Hamptons, and was not very much concerned with his process of making a film. However he did not finish it, and he left behind some very key interviews with friends where he talked about the film and said, "Well, the only way I could make it is if I make it much more about myself. But I'm just not prepared to do that." And so in some way the Gordian knot that had to be untied was: How do you actually get him to be present in this movie when he avoided that so much -- whether by shooting landscapes or other people, or shooting his mother, or shooting anything but himself? There was just this giant missing hole in the center of the movie. For a time I thought maybe Susan [Meiselas] could fill that spot as a sort of narrator or host through his story. There was a time when I thought I would fill that spot, telling the adventures of me as a young filmmaker piecing together these pieces. There was a time where I thought Wally [Shawn] would be sort of the star; he would take over and kind of just become Dick. But none of those plans really worked. And so the eventual result is a bit of a mix of all of those three strategies, with the key aesthetic realization being that you couldn't really take the movie away from Dick, that he had to be the center of the movie. The trick became how to inject these elements, which were needed to fill up the center, without actually feeling like you had taken the focus off of him. The subtlety is that, yes, I do make you feel like he's making his movie. But that is actually an invention. That's part of the conceit. I'm in a way creating that story for you to hear.

I didn't know Dick, but after watching your film I felt that he never would have finished his movie. It seemed like one of those lifelong and ultimately quixotic ambitions. Having spent so much time with the footage, yes, I agree. He left a 90-second piece of voiceover, which is in the film, where he talks about his father making Super 8 films. It's the only thing he left behind that showed any kind of direction toward synthesizing the material in a personal way. And that voice is when he's already sick. Part of me is tempted to think: "Well, maybe at the very end he did see how to synthesize this in his own first person and tell a story with voiceover like his colleague Ross McElwee" We don't know. But I certainly have to take responsibility -- any sense you get that his journey was quixotic was written by me. And yet there's sort of a Russian doll kind of dynamic to it. Those words are written by me, in his spirit, but it's certainly my creative interpretation of telling a story about him.

In any documentary what you leave out is much a choice as what you leave in. So perhaps what's on the cutting-room floor would have given me a different impression of him. Were there, in fact, multiple "Dick Rogers" there are not in this film? Well, Dick's friend Robert Benton, who lives in Georgica, said something to me that I'll always remember. "In many ways when you write the most important end of your pencil is the eraser." And it proved to be so true because I was starting out with so much. I wasn't wrestling with 300 hours of crowded pages. In terms of the facets, the sides, of Dick, I tried my best to include as many of them as possible because that makes him a complex, interesting and contradictory person. There were a lot of questions as to what the balance would be [between] his intellectual [side], how confident he was, and how charming he was in real life versus his anxieties about himself and his relationships with women. Aside from the footage, my sources for information were his widow, other women that he had dates, and his friends. There was no "impartial record" of his life I could go consult. "The movie should really be like this, Alex," was something that a lot of people would essentially be saying when I would ask them about things.

You can read the full interview by subscribing to our digital issue.

We highly recommend checking out the film.

Here's the theatrical trailer to wet your appetite.

MAGGIE Q, AWARD-WINNERS AT HIFF

2009-10-28T16:09:00.003-04:00

The Hawaii International Film Festival (HIFF) wrapped up its 29th incarnation this past weekend with encore screenings of its award-winning films and a closing night honoring of actress Maggie Q, who was on hand to introduce her newest film, Tian Zhuangzhuang’s fantasy swordplay epic The Warrior and the Wolf.

A successful Hong Kong fashion model who morphed into a film career there and later in China and Hollywood (she’s appeared in such diverse films as Gen-Y Cops, Rice Rhapsody, Three Kingdoms, and Live Free or Die Hard), Maggie Q (nee Maggie Quigley) is actually not from Hong Kong at all, or even Chinese; in fact, she’s half-Vietnamese and Polish/Irish, and was born and raised in Hawaii. After graduating high school in Honolulu she left to pursue a fashion career in Japan and Hong Kong, but quickly found herself switching from still images to moving ones; unable to speak Cantonese for her first film appearances, she learned her lines phonetically. Ironically, having re-relocated back to the U.S., she’s now often forced to convince casting directors that she’s American.

Q received HIFF’s Maverick Award, given to “honor a a cinema artist who defies the rules, forging a unique film career, transcending labels and thresholds to vacillate between Hollywood and global cinema,” as executive director Chuck Boller notes. Q’s certainly an appropriate choice, one made even more fitting by her deep Hawaii roots (“Class of Mililani High ’95,” noted festival director Anderson Le, to a few shouts from the crowd).

The accompanying screening of The Warrior and the Wolf was also an appropriate choice as a cinematic vision; director Tian, best known for his controversial 1986 Tibet-set masterpiece The Horse Thief and his 1993 The Blue Kite, began his career as part of China’s revered 5th Generation filmmaking movement along with Zhang Yimou, Chen Kaige, and others, with films that directly or indirectly questioned China’s past, present, and future. Now that his colleagues are now making big-budgeted, candy-coated costume-drama epics (Zhang Yimou with swordplay fantasies Hero and House of Flying Daggers; Chen Kaige with The Promise, for instance), Tian appears to have joined them with with The Warrior and the Wolf, but its swordplay premise (Chinese general fighting “rebellious tribes” in the country’s desolate outlying regions long, long ago) is soon fragmented by something utterly surprising, a poetic, moody vision of doomed love and sorrow. Tian appears totally uninterested in the narrative, in fact, or even the action; the result is not for all, but quite lovely in its delirious imagery and ultimate emotional effect.

At a luncheon earlier in the week, the festival also announced its award-winning films. China swept both Best Narrative Feature and Best Documentary Feature, with the former awarded to Yao Shuhua’s 1899-set family epic Empire of Silver and the latter to Zhao Liang’s powerful Petition, about the groups of citizens gathered around Beijing’s many government-complaints offices, waiting patiently or impatiently (often for years) to have their grievances heard. The NETPAC (Network for the promotion of Asian Cinema) Award was received by South Korea’s Castaway on the Moon, by Lee Hey-jun, while the Puma Emerging Filmmaker Award was presented to Tze Chun’s riveting American indie, Children of Invention. The Video-on-Demand Viewers Choice Award was given to the Hawaii-made short, Ajumma! Are You Krazy?, directed by Brent Anbe, a hilarious comedy about a group of star-struck female fans going to any lengths possible during the appearance of their Korean acting idol at, you guessed it, a film festival.

We’ll have a full wrap-up of the festival later next week. To see the first report from this year’s HIFF here.